Thanks to Dick Puddlecote I can now create tidy links but that wasn't the only thing I learned at the TICAP conference held last Monday at the Hague in the Netherlands. I also heard from eminent scientists and doctors about how the anti-smoking lies gained credence.
The organisations like ASH UK and ASH US knew they didn't have evidence so what they did was to continually send out biased and inflated information to a beleagured press which didn't have the resources to do any more than take their word for it.
Michael McFadden who wrote the excellent book "dissecting anti-smokers' brains" told of how the anti-smoking industry claims that living with a smoker greatly increases the chances of a non-smoker getting lung cancer is designed to create fear and prejudice. In truth, the real stats show that the increase in risk is so small it is neglible which is what professor Richard Doll said. He was the first to link active smoking with cancer but he also said passive smoking was something that carried no real risk to non-smokers. It was something, he said, that we shouldn't fear.
McFadden gave the true stats. It appears that the risk goes up from 4/1000 to 5/1000 after 40 YEARS which really doesn't justify the exlcusion of smokers from every indoor public place.
Other speakers of interest were David Goerlitz. He worked for the JR Reynolds tobacco company in the 1980s and his job was to attract younger smokers to replace those that died or gave up. He felt his work was immoral and so he joined the anti-smoking industry and visited schools to persuade kids not to take up the habit. It is because of what he saw as corrupt science used by the anti-smoking industry that paid for the results it wanted that he now speaks against the corrupt tactics they use.
Goerlitz believes that it is wrong to smoke but he also believes that when the risks are known, it is up to adult smokers to make their own life choices and they should not be discriminated against because of it. He is against the use of junk science to achieve an ideological aim, and he doesn't agree that smokers should be persecuted for their lifestyle choice. This is why he has left the anti-smoking movement and he now works to expose its lies and corruption.
Dr Kamal Chaouachi, from the University of Paris, spoke about hookah pipe smoking. He said the Muslim community has smoked the pipe for centuries and it is very much a part of their social culture. He said Muslims across the world are angry at the way hookah smoking is manipulated by the anti-smoking industry. It has produced posters showing smoke billowing from the pipe which doesn't even use tobacco. It is a mixture of charcoal and flavours and it has no "side stream smoke". To show it in anti-smoking posters in a bid to create the same kind of fear and prejudice goes against the Koran which says there should be good science from cradle to grave - and not junk science created to achieve an ideological aim.
I found it a great concern and tragedy that Dr Chaouachi was warned by tobacco control colleagues that should he speak at this conference, then he would be discredited, shunned and his career would be jeapordised. He is a brave man. He believes truth is important and those scientists who create reports to achieve the aim their anti-smoking paymasters want should be exposed and embarrassed for their outrageous claims. He says this will end the use of junk science.
I attended with two friends - one works in a pub an the other is an independant pub landlady fighting to survive in a pub where all the customers and staff smoke. We stayed in Amsterdam, keen to check out the smoking policy there. It was quite bizarre. Most establishments discreetly allowed the smoking of tobacco - even if it had to be rolled under ths table while marijunana was clearly displayed and rolled on tables. Other establishments banned tobacco smoking but allowed hash to be smoked throughout.
I took my new digital camera with me. I'm not much of a photographer but I thought it was time I got to grips with new photographic technology instead of using my outated film loaded Olympus. I bought a cheap one so that I could learn how to handle it before gettng one of better quality. Unfortunately, this meant that most of my photos were blurred. The shot above of a pretty building in Amsterdam was one of three that turned out clearly.
I was approached by a couple of people with interesting offers after the conference. One I would be keen to follow up. It concerns a forthcoming conference in India. The other didn't interest me at all. It was about rumour mongering. Another thing I learned in the Hague was that the pro-choice movement doesn't need to tell lies - we have right and truth on our side.